


The Melancholy of Dib Membrane

by Ultimate_Nerd_Lady



Category: Invader Zim, The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
Genre: Attempted Murder, Gen, High School, Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya au, My oc plays the role of Kyon, Okay now for serious warnings, Threats, hi skool, or as they say in this fandom, pedophillia mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-27
Updated: 2020-06-27
Packaged: 2021-03-04 07:08:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24949732
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ultimate_Nerd_Lady/pseuds/Ultimate_Nerd_Lady
Summary: When your first day of Hi Skool starts with some kid making claims about fantasy and paranormal investigation you can’t help but raise a few eyebrows. And hearing what everyone has to say about him, you start to wonder if this guy is as crazy as you think, or if life itself is just that insane.
Relationships: Tak/Tenn
Kudos: 5





	The Melancholy of Dib Membrane

Stories of magic and powers, and good vs evil were always Leona’s weakness. A nice escape from her crappy little life. She’d tried making her own adventure a few times and had the scars up and down her torso to prove it. The world wasn’t nice enough to give her her wish though.

In the end, the world is not a nice place where good wins no matter what. Quite the opposite really. And she’d figured that out and started going back to skool after many skip days. It probably wasn’t going to go too well, since skool never did for people like her, but she just wanted a play at a normal life for a little bit. They said Hi Skool was some of the best years of your life. And skepticism be damned, she was gonna attend for it.

“I’m Leona Sumali. Over the summer I… kinda just stayed home and watched anime.” She got a few laughs from the classroom “Anyways, I’m planning to have fun here. Get good grades, join some clubs, the works. Should be great.”

She sat down silently praying her introduction wasn’t too bad. She felt embarrassed just saying it. And she hoped this turtleneck was dark enough that nobody could see traces of the scars underneath. It along with the grey leggings, were perfectly picked not to stand out but that could only go so far. But a few seconds later that didn’t seem to be a problem anymore. Because that’s when the boy behind her stood up.

“My name is Dib Membrane. I’m a paranormal investigator.” 

A what? Leona turned around and looked at who was talking. He was tall, and thin as a pencil, which looked like a problem when that thin body was holding up the massive size of his head. He had a black scythe of hair, and a wide pair of glasses, and tying the ridiculous look together was a black trench coat you’d expect from some edgy anime protagonist.

“My favorite show is Mysterious Mysteries… I spend a lot of time hunting paranormal entities on my own. And I know this all sounds crazy, but that’s why I’m always working to prove it!”

Well the classroom busted a gut laughing. Leona didn’t know what the guy expected. He just gave an indignant sigh and sat down with a huge blush. He seemed to notice Leona staring so she quickly averted her gaze. Best not associate with him.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Well as it turned out, Dib Membrane was just as eccentric as that first impression made him seem. According to people who went to the same middle skool as him, he insisted some kid named “Zim” was an alien from a race called irkens, before this “Zim” just disappeared one day. He constantly had a story about his latest “finds” that he didn’t have any proof of, and he would usually come in on mondays covered in dirt after a weekend hunting for the elusive Bigfoot who wrecked his belt sander.

Also apparently the guy was a big old trust fund kid. His dad was the world famous Professor Membrane as their science teacher lovingly pointed out in front of the whole class. The guy had plenty of the inventing smarts as well, seeing how he managed to invent a fully functioning and learning trivia device for their robotics project. It made Leona’s claw machine she jokingly made to click the “I’m not a robot” agreement on websites before falling apart like it was made of toothpicks look like a useless pile of scrap metal.

At lunch he didn’t even sit at the table, lovingly dubbed “The Rejects Table” (though Leona herself wasn’t so lucky as to not end up there. News about your life story spreads quick in this skool) instead sitting at an empty table alone with his sister.

“So this Zim just disappeared one day?” Leona asked Gretchen. Keef was way too clingy to be able to start a conversation with without him latching onto your arm for the next week, Dirge wouldn’t stop trying to show off his webbed feet, and she couldn’t get a word in to that other guy without him running away screaming, so Gretchen it was. “Where did he go?”

“Well… I dunno. 3 years ago, Zim just disappeared and nobody knew what happened. He threw himself into finding out. Stopped coming to class for a while. But then it died down a bit.”

“Huh. Weird stuff.”

“I think it’s kind of mysterious and dreamy…” 

“So do you actually believe any of his rants?” Leona questioned.

“Well… no.”

Leona took a bite of the disgusting cold mush being passed off as mashed potatoes and stared at the table where Dib was ranting about something to his sister. So he also had a phase where he stopped going to skool. The line of questioning seemed to raise more questions about the boy than it answered. And she had a lot of questions.

One morning in homeroom while Dib was engaged in a copy of Crop Circles magazine, Leona couldn’t take the silence anymore.

“So, that coat… did you snag it off a vampire or something?”

“Huh?” He looked up from his reading “Are you talking to me?”

“Yes…”

“Oh. Well, it’s not. I just made it myself. I think it makes me look mysterious.” He had a confident smile on his face. “And I’ve been adjusting its size to fit me ever since I was 12.”

“That’s… really nerdy.”

His smile fell in an instant.

“Okay. I’m not listening to this.”

“Wait, wait.” She put up her hands “I don’t mean that word as an insult. Promise. In fact I actually did want a coat like that for a while.”

“Oh. Well I made this pretty easy so you could probably make one on your own if you really wanted.”

“Yeah, well you also made that advanced robot in science pretty easily so I’m not too confident about that.” Leona shrugged “I don’t see why you don’t just try and do that instead of the ghosts and goblins business. You’d probably get teased less if you did that.”

“You’re right but I don’t want to.” Dib said “I don’t want to dedicate my entire life to just being the next version of my dad. The whole “real science”- that’s what he calls it- is boring! Why would I ever want to spend my life just having my eyes shut to any possibility?”

“Huh… interesting perspective.” That was being nice. Really, it sounded naive as all hell. The kid was an heir to a massive empire who could snap his fingers and make everything go his way if he wanted, and the seat he was born in would guarantee he’d get it, and he was seriously turning that down? She had to wonder what ghost hunts he was going on to want to justify that- and she somehow felt a pang of jealousy of all things? “So you’re not even tempted?”

“Not really. I’m tempted constantly. Especially since the biggest reason I did this just…” he stopped talking. Wait, was this about that Zim guy? “And I could definitely do without all the trips to the rubber room.”

“Wait. You’ve been committed to institutions?” 

“Yeah. Usually I just escape and go home and then they won’t bother me for a while until I get sent back.” He started talking almost to himself before he began realizing what he was saying and started to stiffen “I am sane though! I promise! I know it doesn’t seem that way, but you have to believe me! I’m-“

“Okay, okay, I believe you!” Leona shouted putting up her hands.

“You… you do?”

She just said it on instinct and was about to tell him that actually, every second talking to him made her think he was loopier and loopier but… Oh man. That guy had some serious puppy-dog eyes. 

“Sure. Of course.” She forced a smile.

“Oh my god! Thank you so much!” He smiled “Nobody believes me! This is really…”

“Okay, cut the waterworks!”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Well, she told the guy she believed him. And she ended up laying awake that night wondering why she did that. It was kind of instinctual. Maybe because she still wanted to believe. Guess she didn’t grow out of that as much as she thought. Whatever it was, Dib asked her to meet him in one of the rooms after skool that day. Morbid curiosity led her to follow instructions and opened the door to see Dib talking to a girl with indigo hair.

“Oh, hey, Tak said we could use this room for a club.” Dib waved.

“Oh…” She’d seen Tak around skool. The girl was apparently the heiress to Deelishus Weenies, and was pretty popular because of it. She supposed rich kids just stuck together like that. “Wait, what club?”

“Well I was thinking, why not have a club dedicated to tracking down the supernatural? We believers can gather together and find proof!”

“Huh…” she felt the part of her face where she had a scar covered with foundation “And you’ve gotten takers for this club?”

“Yeah, more than I expected actually! There’s Tak here, and my sister Gaz…” Leona looked to see the goth casually pressing buttons on her game slave. “And uh… Keef.”

Leona noticed Keef smiling and waving at her.

“... We needed another member to officially be a club, and he was the only one not turning it down.” Dib sighed “But never mind! We’ve got big things ahead of us!”

“Like your head?” Leona muttered.

“Bigger. Mostly because my head is normal sized.” He declared “So I’m thinking our first few meetings should be something simple. Like ghost hunting. Then we move up to more  _ dangerous  _ ghosts-“

“No, I think your head is pretty big Dib.” Keef interrupted.

“No it’s not! Come on guys, work with me here!”

“If we’re looking for ghosts, maybe you can give some presentation?” Tak suggested “Not all of us have seen any.” 

“Oh! Good idea! So if we start with that maybe…”

As the two discussed the clubs course of action, Leona just sat down next to Gaz in the corner.

“Hi. I’m Leona.”

She didn’t give any response. Okay, that made sense. She didn’t have the most friendly demeanor. Unfortunately, that meant she was mostly spending the club meeting in uncomfortable silence. 

With a good amount of tuning out the speech, the day managed to end, and Dib walked out after Gaz with an undeniable bounce in his step.

Leona watched him trail out, and stretched her arms in a yawn before Tak managed to sneak up behind her and tap her shoulder to which she pouted and put her in a lock.

“Oh! Tak! Sorry!” She held up both hands and then put them behind her back sheepishly. Looks like this club revived her old fighting instincts a little.

“Hm. You’re quite rude aren’t you?” She leaned in, in a manner clearly meant to intimidate her. A total 180 from the pleasant attitude she had with ghost freak. “I’ve heard about you though. So it’s not a surprise how… uncultured you are.”

“Uh-Huh…” she looked to the side, then back at Tak “Well, you look like you haven’t grown out of your hot topic phase just yet.”

Tak glared at her for a few moments and Leona made a triumphant smirk at her victory over the resident mean girl, but then Tak grabbed her wrist forcing eye contact between them.

“Listen, Leona Sumali. You’re gonna go home. And you’re going to read this book. Got it?”

She shoved a book into her hands. Leona would say no to the asshole who insulted her then made a demand of her, but somehow she felt compelled to follow her order.

“Yes Tak.”

And she robotically walked home and opened the book. It wasn’t until she was a few pages in she regained something like consciousness.

“Ah!” She threw the book away like it was on fire “What was that?!”

Something seemed to fall away from the book as it soared away from her. She curiously scooted towards it and picked up the small purple bookmark.

“Meet me at this address. Alone.” She read aloud looking at the place listed on the bookmark “As if I’d do that.”

She stepped downstairs folding her arms and hoping grandma wasn’t down there. She was- just her luck- so she just took the second best option of doing her best to ignore her while she grabbed her dinner- or more precisely a poop soda and a microwaveable tin of Mac and Cheese. She stuck it in there listening to the hums fill the room until ice crawled up her spine at Grandmas voice actually arising.

“You were back late for the first time in a while today.”

“Uh… kind of got dragged into something.”

“Dragged into something?!” She turned to her “What hap-“

“No, no, it was nothing like that! Just some club.”

“Ugh. You scared me.” She sighed “Well have fun with that.”

“Mm-hm.” The microwave beeped and Leona grabbed her food at top speed and dashed upstairs.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next day in skool, Tak approached her.

“So, idiot, read that book?”

“The one you recommended to me after you insulted me?” 

“Well?”

She probably wanted her to see the bookmark.

“Nope. Sorry.”

Tak narrowed her eyes, before speaking a command.

“Tell me the truth.” 

Leona’s mouth moved on its own.

“I saw the bookmark. I just ignored it.”

She slapped herself across the face. What was that?! Tak’s eyes narrowed into slits. 

“You will come tonight-“

Leona shut her eyes. When she opened them, Taks face was contorted in rage.

“Excuse me, what’s going on here?”

“Ah- Tenn!”

Leona gasped as the student council president walked over to them. She was also the person very publically dating Tak- which didn’t suggest good things for her personality. 

“We’re just talking. She’s the one who’s also in the club Dib Membrane started.” Tak decreed. Tenn looked at Leona and nodded in approval.

“That’s great! I’m hoping you bring some change about in Dib Membrane!”

Ugh. Like hell it was her job to get through to that nutball. 

“I hate to break it to you, but first chance I get I’m quitting that club.” She said.

“I don’t think you should. You see-“

The bell rang and Leona stood up and began leaving. But look who followed.

“You’re just going to quit?” Tak demanded.

“Yeah. I don’t believe in that fantasy crap.”

“I highly doubt that’s true.”

“Psh.” She sneered “Don’t act like you know me.”

“I’ve had my eye on you for a little bit.” Tak said “Ever since you struck up a talk with Membrane the other day.”

“... Well, you can’t gauge all there is to know about me from a few days of stalking me. Leave me alone.”

She waited for an answer but didn’t get one. Looks like she shook off the stalker.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

When she got home and to her room that day, she threw her backpack against the wall. The test she got back with a D- fell out so she picked it up and tore it to shreds throwing the failure confetti up in the air. 

Going back to skool was her biggest mistake. She had no friends, her grades weren’t improving, and nothing changed. She didn’t even have her old starry eyed want for adventure keeping her going. It was just stumbling through life.

Oh god. This was how her life was gonna be was it? She’d known it for a long time, but after months locked in Hi Skool, it really was sinking in. She was worthless. Worthless and… oh god not the waterworks.

She desperately wrestled with herself to hold back the onslaught of tears but there was no fighting with her tear ducts and she scrounged around on the ground with her hand for anything to use as a tissue and her hand landed on the purple bookmark from the night before.

It still didn’t say anything different. Still a note from a random person she barely knew and joined the wacko club, not to mention seemed to have some oddly persuasive demeanor was asking her to come somewhere alone. This was the easiest way to get put on a milk carton. But… 

“Fuck it.” She rose from the ground taking out her phone to call a taxi. Time to throw her life away.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So as it turned out, Tak was in front of the gates of her mansion waiting for her, with a smug looking glower once she noticed her coming.

“I knew you’d come around.”

“Yeah, so what of it?”

“Follow me.” She punched in a code to the gates and they opened without problem. Then she motioned for Leona to follow. Leona reconsidered how stupid this was once again, before realizing she didn’t care and following after Tak.

What struck her as odd about the house was the lack of anyone around. In all the movies and anime she saw, filthy rich people always had about 50 servants crawling around their house. The place was strangely silent however. Not even signs of a caretaker to look after the child who was left alone. Hey, there weren’t even any pictures of anyone!

She did notice at one point, when they were headed up the stairs, a cat started following Tak around, and moved in such an odd way like it was waiting for any opportunity to pounce on prey.

_ That’s gonna be what fucking kills me today. _

“Sit in the upstairs dining room. Mimi will prepare us some food.”

“Who’s Mimi?” She asked before noticing the cat slip away “Wait. Please tell me Mimi is not your cat.”

“That’ll be the least of surprises you hear today.” Tak said sitting in one of the only two seats at the table “Sit down.”

Leona rolled her eyes and pulled out a chair, half expecting metal bars to close around her as she sat, and being just a little disappointed when they did not do that.

“So, Dib Membrane. What do you think of him?”

“Oh god. You didn’t drag me to your mansion for boy talk did you?” She cringed “You have the worst taste-“

“It’s not some immature crush talk you simpleton!” Tak snapped.

“Simpleton? What century are you from when you say that?” She cracked a smile “‘Oh dear me! Who are these simpletons from a barbaric land?’”

“You don’t grasp the magnitude of this situation Leona Sumali.” Tak growled.

“What situation?” She rolled her eyes. God knows she did not have any preparation for what she heard next.

“Dib Membrane was homed in on by the irken empire three years ago.” She declared “He was an entity never seen by the likes of us before but he radiated such power that out of nowhere, scanners locked onto him.”

“... What?” Leona raised an eyebrow “Wait- irkens? Isn’t that where that Zip guy I’ve been hearing about comes from-“

“The irken referred to as Zim does not exist anywhere in our histories records. In addition no irken contact was made with this planet until Dib Membrane was discovered 3 years ago. It’s unknown how an irken can exist in the consciousness of so many people. But it appears to be part of the influence of Dib Membrane.”

“Really.” She leaned back partly wondering if this was all true, partly wanting to tell Tak to her face that she sounded like a lunatic “So what kind of power does he have?”

“Complete spatial manipulation.” Tak said in a dead serious voice “He can change whatever he wants. Whenever he wants. However he wants.”

“So why doesn’t he use it then? I mean, I’m 99% sure if he had this power he’d make all his bigfeets and ghosts appear to prove he’s not crazy.”

“That’s the thing. When me and my partner arrived on this planet, we realized he isn’t even aware of the power he has. He’s completely clueless.”

“You and your partner?” She stopped playing with the fork she’d unconsciously started fooling around with “You don’t mean-“

“Yes. I am a member of the irken race.”

Leona was getting a headache. Yes this sounded absolutely amazing but what this girl just did was spit out a bunch of crazy unbelievable stories without proof. 

“So, why are you telling me this?” She asked nonchalantly waiting for the reveal this was all to punk her.

“Because.” Tak rose up and looked down at her, a wide smile on her face “You just might be what triggers his use of this power.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Leona came to skool the next day running on barely any sleep. She’d spent all night laying awake trying to decipher if she could believe any of Taks mumbo jumbo. It was definitely noticeable enough for Dib to comment.

“Whoa, you look like hell.”

“I think I might’ve been there last night.” She yawned “How about you nerd? Anything interesting?”

“Well… I have a club meeting planned for Saturday. 1PM. At McMeaties. I hope to see you.”

“Mm-hm…” she took a mental note “Say, what do you think of Tak?”

“Uh… what about her?”

“Well she uh…” she briefly considered telling him about the stuff Tak told her last night, but then she decided she did not have the energy. “I noticed you and her were talking up a storm for our first meeting.”

“Oh yeah. It’s weird. We never talked but when I started the club she came up to me and said she wanted to join.” He explained “Why do you think that is?”

“Uh…”

_ “You just might be what triggers his use of this power.” _

_ “ _ No idea.” She told him. That was at least partly true. She didn’t have any idea what these irkens wanted or anything like that. Well wasn’t he fighting with Zin for a while? But then again that guy probably didn’t exist so that was up in the air. Grrrr she was so confused! “Hey, can I ask you something.”

“Sure. Anything.” He smiled confidently “Not to brag but I’m a bit of an expert in a lot of fields.”

“That sounds like bragging.” She retorted “But, not my issue. Uh… I heard you and some guy named Zim were rivals for some time. Can you tell me about that?”

“Oh.” Suddenly he looked uncomfortable as hell “Uh… that’s kind of awkward.”

“What? Did he decide fighting you wasn’t worth the trouble and left?”

“No it’s not that it’s just…” he placed an elbow on the desk “I don’t actually remember him.”

Leona’s eyes turned to dinner plates “You don’t remember?”

“I don’t… or I do… I don’t know. Whenever I try to remember it comes back all blurry. And…” he seemed to unconsciously rub the back of his head “I get this really bad pain… it’s weird.”

So… he didn’t exist? Or he did? Did this guy somehow manipulate him out of existence? But why? Did the fact he still sorta remembered hint he had some processing of his ‘powers’? Why was she entertaining that idea still?

“That’s uh… that’s rough buddy.” She grimaced “Maybe it’s some sort of weird mental block? Like… trauma?”

“What? Why would I have that?”

“Just the other day you told me you went to the crazy house for boys multiple times! What do you mean ‘why would I have trauma?’”

“Yeah, but I got out fine!”

Leona raised an eyebrow.

“Mostly fine.”

She narrowed her eyes.

“I frequently have nightmares about the place.” He said, almost ashamed.

“Yeesh…” she directed a gaze towards the floor. Trying to figure out the mysterious Dib powers this guy had just wound up being depressing. 

“... You do believe me right?” She was caught off guard by just how small the voice was. She’d never really taken note but the guy was always talking with some grand dramatic purpose, and even his monologues to himself she’d occasionally heard all were dripping with bravado. This was new.

“I mean, I already told you I did, didn’t I?”

“Well yeah. But I’ve had incidents where people just said they believed me to prank me, or something like that… I mean you kinda… don’t… seem…”

She was about to lie to his face once again, before deciding that the truth would probably be best in the situation.

“You know, I kinda just said I believed you in the heat of the moment. I don’t think I actually have enough bright eyed naïveté to say I can actually find ghosts.”

“... got it.” His features sank. Leona felt a pang of guilt. She was about to say she was gonna quit the club instead of wasting his time, but her mouth and body betrayed her.

“But… you know what?” she slammed a hand on his desk “Going on supernatural hunts is a dream come true for me. I don’t believe in that stuff. But I want to. That’s why I said I believed you.”

“But you don’t actually believe.” He looked down “And you think I’m crazy.”

“Hey, I’m giving you a chance to prove me wrong.” The bell rang and she parted with a wave “See you Saturday.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Leona was stuck sitting next to Keef at the McMeaties meeting which meant having to constantly be stuffing her face to avoid conversation.

“So I’ve gotten intel from truthshrieker forums that a vampire has been spotted in this part of the city.” Dib ranted.

“Yeah.” Leona swallowed her current mouthful and pointed at him with the soggy french fry in her hand “They have a guy dressed as Count Cocofang come here every 3 months for a signing.”

“I mean a real vampire.” Dib rolled his eyes while Gaz snorted out her soda. “So we’re gonna split into groups and find him!”

“Oh! Can I go with you Dib?!” Keef raised his hand.

“Oh. Sure…” he said through his teeth looking for a way out “Well, I guess I’ll take someone else too. Uh…”

“I’ll go.” Tak declared.

“So… I go with the goth girl?” Leona asked, pointing to his sister.

“Her name is Gaz. And yes. Although since you have so little experience paranormal activity you probably won’t- Ow, ow, ow, Gaz, stop stepping on my foot!”

“Alright, let’s go.” Leona gulped down the last of her fries and muscled her way out of the seat, stepping over Keef “Time to find Cocofang.”

“It’s not Cocofang!” Dib shouted indignantly.

“Have fun with Keef, Dib.” Gaz got up snorting and gave a wave while she and Leona walked out of the MacMeaties.

“Alright. So. Do you have any idea whatsoever how to track a vampire?” Leona asked Gaz.

“Yes.” Gaz looked at her like it was the most obvious thing in the world “You can’t?”

“... Of course I can. I’m just asking you.” She replied.

“Whatever. I’m only spending time with you because I have something to tell you.”

“Oh really? Gonna tell me the best deals at Hot Topic?”

She laughed at her own stupid joke when Gaz punched her in the side.

“Ow!” She shouted “Okay sorry. What is it?”

“Don’t invoke my wrath again.” Gaz warned before turning away “Anyways I’m from an alternate universe.”

“... Say what?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Okay okay…” Leona shooed one of the birds approaching the bench her and Gaz were sitting on with her foot “So… explain it to me again.”

“Fine.” Gaz shot the bird Leona was shooing a look full of intent to hurt and the bird immediately split from the scene “I came here 3 years ago. My brother was researching this universe due to a past incident.”

“Right… so are you and your brother from some universe of demigods or something?”

“What? No. Why would I?”

“Well… it’s just that I heard stuff about your brother-“

“No you haven’t.” Gaz interrupted “You’re talking about the Dib here. That’s not my universe. I just came over.”

“Alright… and what happened to this universes Gaz?” 

“Don’t worry about it.”

“Well now I am worried!” She shouted. Gaz just gave her a threatening snarl and she decided to drop it. “But… why come over here? It’s really weird you’d just decide to drop everything to hang out here for 3 years.”

“Well it’s after my brother disappeared for a week. He came back ranting about some weird universe he went to, full of nothing but Zims.”

The fucking alien again?

“Okay. What Universe was that?”

“This one.”

Huh…? Her head was spinning.

“But that Zim guy isn’t even here! And I’m not Zim! I’m a normal human being!”

“Well you sound just like Zim so not convincing.” Gaz said “But he eventually drew up a picture of this.”

She took a crumpled paper ball out of her pocket and handed it to Leona, who took it in confusion and opened it up to…

“Wait. Is this his fucking oc or something?” She snorted “Zib? Is that his Zimsona? Oh man if I meet your Dib, I’m totally gonna-“

“Actually he’s a version of my brother who went insane and destroyed the universe.” Gaz said “Who’s very likely the Dib we’re looking at.”

Leona dropped the piece of paper and it floated to the ground, snatched up by Gaz before it could be taken by another pigeon.

“Wait, wait, wait… Dib is eccentric, but he doesn’t seem like he’d destroy the universe!”

“Well, my brother is an idiot. But that’s what he told me.” She groaned “And apparently our Zim wiped out the other universes. Turns out though, it was more of a soft reboot.”

“You’re kidding.”

“Oh I’m not. Zim is really that stupid.” Gaz said “But it turns out since our Dib was the only thing left in that entire universe, he was the one in charge of making the reboot. So this universe was made.”

“No way.” Leona whispered.

“Way.” Gaz replied.

“So wait, this raises so many more questions!” Leona shouted.

“Yeah well. Dib was gonna travel to this ratchety old universe since he was so worried about what Zib would do, but he ate the chocolate pudding I was saving, so I stole it and took it for my own joyride. But the idiot didn’t even have enough fuel for two trips.”

“Oh. Oh dear.” Leona leaned back “That’s depressing.”

“Eh. He’s been working on a way to get me back. And he found a way to communicate with me. Always screaming that he’ll save me. The idiot just can’t find an efficient fuel source.” She shrugged “In the meantime, I just dealt with this universes Gaz and started hanging out like nothing happened-“

“Okay, what the hell did you do to her?!” Leona shouted.

“You’re testing my patience.” Gaz growled and Leona involuntarily whimpered.

“Now come on. Dibs probably gotten into trouble with something he shouldn’t be messing with by now. Let’s go save him.”

“Whatever you say.” Leona stood up and followed her “So why did you tell me this?”

“Figure it out.” She replied “I’m done explaining things.”

Well, alrighty then. This was getting interesting.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Tak. Alien sent from another world or bratty rich girl playing a prank?

Gaz. Universal traveler, or possibly murderous crazy person?

Dib. God of the universe as we know it, or emo teenager with an obsession with cryptids?

Leona during the next club meeting at skool couldn’t help looking over the room, observing her fellow club members' faces. This was all turning into some weird fever dream and she was just caught in the middle. Then she noticed Keef. Oh god. Was she really gonna start a conversation with him?

“So the vampire nearly killed us, but after making this garlic bread, we should be able to weaken any who come near us.”

“Can I have some?” Leona raised her hand. 

“No! It’s for vampire hunting purposes.”

“But I’m hungry…”

“Do you wanna get bitten by a vampire?!”

“What, is that a trick question or something?”

“Guys, me and Tenn have a date night tonight. Can we wrap it up?” Tak glared.

Dib waved a hand “Dismissed.”

Tak immediately took leave and Gaz made a mad dash out since  _ Anime People Fighting 7 _ released today. 

“... So.” Leona looked at Dib unsure how to talk to him with the information that he might’ve been responsible for destroying the universe as we know it “You collect stickymon cards?”

“Huh? No. I uh-“

“Oh! I do!” Keef bounded over your them.

“... I’m really sorry.” Leona grimaced.

“Did you watch the anime? I see you have a lot of anime stuff.” Keef smiled.

“Oh. Well uh, I mean…” well this was embarrassing.

“Yeesh that’s really embarrassing.” Dib said.

“It is not embarrassing!” Leona yelled “Anime is an important form of storytelling that’s persisted for years!”

She huffed and tried reaching for a piece of garlic bread, until Dib took the tray away.

“I never thought I’d see you get angry.” Keef remarked. Oh god. She just got really defensive over her love of anime. Now that was embarrassing. She looked over to Dib who was clearly trying to hold back laughter.

“Shut up.” She snapped.

“I didn’t say anything!” 

“You were saying it with your face.” 

“Hey can I have a piece of the garlic bread?” Keef asked.

“No! What part of ‘this is so we don’t have all our blood drained by vampires’ do you people not understand?!”

“So what anime do you like?” Keef tapped Leona on the shoulder “I noticed you had a copy of Big Guns and Swords-“

“Don’t bring that up!” She shouted standing up and covering his mouth.

“Big Guns and Swords? Isn’t that the one with-“

“Let’s change the topic!” She shouted.

“Change it to what?”

“Literally anything else!” She hissed “For example…” she began racking her brain. Then one question in particular popped up. One she’d been wondering for a while. Her gaze turned to the big-headed (in more ways than one) teen and bit her lip.

“For example what?”

“For example… if you could create a world where people believed in you, would you take the opportunity?”

“Uh… yeah. Obviously.”

“Really? There’s no reason you can think of why you wouldn’t do that?”

“Do I have to bring up the Crazy House for Boys again?” He crossed his arms “Even my own dad calls me ‘his poor insane son’! Of course I want people to believe me! And you think I’m crazy too don’t you?!”

“What? No… pbbbbbt…” she did her best to avoid meeting his eyes “I said I was going along with it didn’t I?”

“... You’re a bad liar.” He glared “I knew starting this club was a mistake. You don’t even care! Do you even know what it’s like for nobody to think you’re worth anything?”

“... Yeah, pretty intimately actually.”

She wasn’t looking directly at him, but she was able to catch his expression being caught off guard.

“That’s not a joke is it?”

“It’s not. It’s kind of a long story but-“ she then yanked her hand away from Keefs mouth at a breakneck pace the second she felt something “Did you just lick my fucking hand?!”

“Yeah.”

“Alright I’m outta here.” She started storming out “See you later.”

She made her way to the Hi Skool entrance opening the doors and- how did Keef get out there before her?

“Hi.”

“Oh let me guess. You’re an esper or something, here to tell me about Dib, right?”

“How did you know?!”

She didn’t know how to respond at this point. She just groaned like hell.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“What happened with Dib? I thought the club started cause you said you believed him.”

“That was a lie I told to get him off my back.” Leona retorted gulping down her coffee. It was filled with espresso shots and a ton of cream, so it wasn’t really good on her heart, but she had to do something to muster up the energy to deal with this crap. She slammed down the paper cup but instead of feeling ready to talk about any of this she was just vibrating really fast. “What was I gonna tell him? That I didn’t believe him? He sits behind me and he’d bother me until the end of-“

“Leona, you’re talking too fast for me to understand.”

“Uuuuuuugh-“ Leona punched herself in the forehead in rapid succession “Just tell me what you know about him.”

“... I kinda wanted to talk more about you. I know about your… backstory. I think you do believe. More than anyone. Maybe even more than him. Why else would you be constantly trying to find some adventure?”

“I mean I did. But-“

“You should be nice to Dib! You have a lot in common with him! I know he’s a little rough around the edges but I think if you tried you’d really-“

“You wanna know why I’m keeping my distance?! Why I‘m not buying in to this crazy nonsense?!” She shouted. She lifted up her shirt to reveal a myriad of scars, a noticeably big and deep one around her stomach. “Take a good long look. This is what I got when I tried picking fights for my adventure!” She bought the shirt down and slammed her hand down on the table. “And did it come? No! I was just coming home with a bunch of injuries I had to hide and treat myself because I was scared of what would happen if I revealed them to my grandma!”

“Uh… hey… people are staring.” Keef mentioned. Leona looked around. Of course. She sank back into her seat cursing herself for consuming so much caffeine.

“Never mind. Tell me about yourself.”

“Well… I have esp! It’s pretty convenient sometimes. Even though it screws a lot with my vision.”

“Your vision?” She questioned.

“Yeah. Normal objects are fine, but with living things, I can only see their auras. For example, you just look like a mass of black right now.”

“Hey, quit peeking at my aura!” She shouted backing up.

“Oh. Sorry.” He closed his eyes “But I try and keep my aura in the yellow. It’s good to have it be a nice color.”

“Just yellow? You always seem like you’re gonna vomit up rainbows.”

“Well, I’m not the person who created auras. Dib Membrane is.”

“Yeah. He created everything?”

“Mm-hm! He’s essentially what you’d call God.”

God. And she just mouthed him off earlier. She snorted at the thought. And it collapsed into a fit of giggles. She was never drinking coffee again after this.

“So… god. If he’s god there’s one thing I don’t understand. Why wouldn’t he make it so people believed him? If he wanted to, he could make it so everyone thought he was perfect and he didn’t go on weekly trips to the insane asylum.”

“That’s something us espers have been trying to figure out for 3 years. We haven’t seen any progress.”

“Ugh.” She stood up “If you can’t figure it out, I’ll do it myself. Bye bye.”

Keef said nothing. That was not like him.

“Any comments?” She asked him.

“Oh! Sorry!” Keef laughed “It’s just… your aura just changed color the slightest bit.”

“... Duly noted.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next day in skool, she sat in front of Dib in awkward silence. They’d been talking a lot since the whole club started but with yesterday’s argument, there was too much tension in the air for either of them to say anything, so they were locked in stalemate.

“Uh…” Dib was the first to talk “I found this in my desk.”

Leona looked behind her to see Dib holding an envelope with a heart seal.

“What the hell! Did you write me a love letter?!” She screeched.

“No! I told you it was in my desk! It’s addressed to you!”

He showed her the back to see… her name written in magazine letter cut-outs. How charming. She cautiously plucked it out of his hands, took the note out and read the inside.

“I’ve had my eye on you for a while and I want to take action. Meet me in room 44 after skool.” She read aloud “No way this isn’t a prank.”

“So you’re not going?”

“Eh, I’ll go. Nothing better to do.”

They sat in awkward silence for a few more seconds.

“So, what did you mean yesterday?”

“... I don’t know what you’re talking about.” She lied.

“You know! About… the…”

“Let me guess. Since you told me your tragic backstory, you wanna hear mine?” She narrowed her eyes.

“Yeah, pretty much.”

How direct. She neglected talking for a while and looked out the window. It was a gorgeous, sunshiney day, but nobody could be seen outside. The skoolyard looked like a wasteland.

“... So, your dad is Professor Membrane. Man of science. Inventor of super toast.” Leona held up her hand and waved her fingers around without looking at him “Well, I don’t know much about my dad but I know he’s a piece of shit.”

“How come?”

“Because my mom was 16.” She said matter of factly.

“Oh.”

Leona looked back at him, and noticed he was squirming.

“Of course, he was rich enough to pay people for silence. Meanwhile, mom died while having me, and he didn’t want me so I was stuck with my grandma. Who doesn’t hate me, but I think she partially blames me for her little girl being gone.” She crumpled up the love note “Long story short, life sucks. Nobody wants to be my friend. And nobody expects anything of me. I couldn’t belong anywhere if I tried. Taks found out, Keefs found out. Now you find out.”

That sweet release of the bell sounded out and she stood up but Dib wasn’t finished.

“You can still come to the club.”

“... Thanks.” She didn’t extend her answer past one syllable but couldn’t help the smile growing on her face. “And uh…”

“Yeah? What?” She didn’t look back to see his expression when he asked.

“I… I still do wanna believe. Even if I haven’t seen yet, I’ll keep sticking with it. Promise.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Room 44. This was the place. She opened the door to see that oddly, all the desks and chairs were gone. There was only Tenn, standing in the center.

“Oh. Tenn.” Leona didn’t expect that “Wait. Did Tak put you up to this?”

“Actually, I’m doing this without her knowing.” Tenn rubbed the back of her head “I don’t quite think she’d understand.”

“... Uh-Huh.” Leona leaned against the door “Are you also a... what’s it called… irkenoid?”

“Yes. You’re quite perceptive to figure it out.”

“Eh… not really.” She said “So, what are you calling me here for?”

“Well… It’s just that things are at a stalemate.” Tenn sighed “We’ve been waiting and waiting, but nothing’s happening. It’s been weeks since you made contact with Dib Membrane and triggered action from him, but he still doesn’t use his power!”

“Huh…” she somehow always separated Dib, the person she hung out with and occasionally jabbed at and the Dib who was literally god as two separate entities. Maybe because he was just so much of someone she felt level talking too? Ugh, why was she thinking about this? “So… what do you want me to do about it?”

“I don’t think you’re gonna like it.” Tenn said “So I’ll get it over with.”

Suddenly, the door, no, the wall behind Leona itself vanished into thin air and she was falling backwards onto a space with no definable ground or sky or anything, while Tenn sprang forward with a metal appendage coming from her backpack. Leona gasped and quickly rolled away before her forehead was pierced and stood up running from her attacker.

“What are you doing?!”

“I’m going to kill you and see how Dib Membrane reacts.” She smiled “It’s the obvious solution.”

Several more appendages, like metallic spider legs sprung forth from her backpack and she lifted herself with them, stalking towards Leona.

“Crap!” Leona dug around in her bookbag, pulling out the latest volume of Big Guns and Swords and held it out to use as a one-time defense against another leg coming her way. It pierced through the pages, just barely not hitting her eye with its sharp point, and then started shaking to get the low-quality manga off. Leona retaliated with a kick to a second leg which, was thankfully strong enough against the thin machinery to knock it off balance at the cost of hurting her foot. It was a good thing she’d had practice fighting before, but that could only carry her so far against alien technology.

“Help!” She screamed, not quite sure which direction the exit used to be anymore, as the world was just a zigzagging fever dream “Somebody help me!”

“You can’t get help, or get out. I’ve used irken technology to completely isolate this room from reality.” She finally regained her posture, towering over her without even looking human anymore as her skin had morphed to be the color green, her eyes were no longer colors and pupils in a sea of white but a complete showcase of red, and her hair was replaced by two antennae curling backwards “You can’t survive. So hurry up and die!”

Leona made a dodge that was sloppy and paid the price with her elbow getting stabbed. Howling in pain she fell to the ground and watched Tenn, lifted 5 feet off the ground, the picture of confidence as she was about to take her life.

“Goodbye Leona Sumali.”

Leona closed her eyes waiting for the moment she couldn’t open them again, but she heard a metal clanging instead. Cautiously she opened her eyes to short indigo hair above her.

“Tak?!”

“I can’t believe I’m protecting you.” Tak sneered at her before looking back at Tenn “What are you doing? We’re invaders. We can’t draw attention to ourselves by murdering this girl.”

“May I remind you, we’re invaders meant to observe and find a way to exploit Dib Membrane’s power?” Tenn retorted taking her leg back for another clash with Taks. The legs from Taks backpack moved to block each blow from Tenns, in a dance that was only made more like something Leona thought she was hallucinating with the seizure inducing myriad of colors surrounding them. “We should be trying to make any triggers possible!”

“And what will happen if you don’t trigger him with this?” Tak shouted leaving one leg out of her guard to go on the offensive “What will you do if we get caught? What if he does become active and he finds out we did it? What do you think will happen then?”

“Then we capture him.” Tenn replied generating a shield between two legs that Tak slashed at “Simple as that.”

“With no way to control him?” Tak cut through the shield and began shooting lasers “We’d be failures!”

“Hey, Tak, I’d really like it if you just said ‘Killing this innocent bystander is wrong’” Leona chimed.

“See, the thing about that is, I don’t care.” Tak replied. Well, Leona didn’t have a retort for that. She just watched the fight pan out hoping that at least the evil alien on her side would win. 

Tak had gotten to propping herself up on the legs like Tenn, and it was a nailbiting fight that Leona would have broken out popcorn for if it weren’t for the whole ‘she might die’ thing. A parry here. A clash of weapons there. A new piece of technology Leona had never seen before over there. But it didn’t look like her side won. Tenn managed to impale Tak through the stomach with two of her legs, and she dropped to the floor.

“It’ll take some time to heal up. But in the meantime I’m going to finish up here.” Tenn declared. 

“Ha. You don’t even realize you lost.” Tak muttered sitting up.

“What do you- AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!” Tenn screamed as electric sparks flew out of her (and also really did not help with the whole seizure inducing background thing) and fell down, the room turning back into a normal classroom, chairs desks and all when she hit the floor. “Dammit. What did you attach to my PAK?”

“It’s a little bug I’ve been working on with Mimi. I didn’t think I’d have to use it on you.” Tak sighed “Just take a nap. We can discuss this when you’ve woken up. And if you do convince me the girl should die.” She looked over at her, eyes full of cold indifference “I’ll get rid of her myself.”

Leona gulped.

“Now, you won’t mention today’s events to anybody, least of all Dib Membrane.” Tak gave her a smile devoid of warmth and a purple light crossed her eyes “Understood?”

“Yes ma’am.” Her mouth moved on its own. So much for calling people for help when her life was in delicate balance. “Uh… so… you’re evil and shit?”

Tak rolled her eyes “Yes, we are evil. ‘And shit’”

“Right.” Leona looked at Tenn “Uh… How long until she wakes up?”

“Don’t know. Haven’t tested it before. I’d get out if I were you.” 

“Huh. Uh…” Leona quietly nudged Tenn with her foot… then ran away fast as possible. 

Holy crap. She could’ve died. Holy crap. They really weren’t human. Holy crap. The stuff she’d been hearing about Dib might actually be true.

A trip to her locker to extract her things and go home for the day, ended with another locker randomly opening and a few pens, a textbook, and a weird iPad spilling out as she did.

“They should really fix the locks.”

She sighed and went to pick up the fallen items noticing the locker had a bunch of posters for vampire piggy hunter, and a coupon for bloaties pizza hog. Then the iPad buzzed and she yelped nearly dropping it, before the screen lit up.

“Hi Gaz, status update I- Wait, you’re not Gaz.”

“Dib?!” She shouted “Why not use a cell phone like a normal person?!”

“How do you know who I am? And I use this because I’m from another dimension!” He shouted “No way, if you’re answering this, is she in trouble?! What kind of-“

“Relax she left it in her locker. From what I know about her she’s probably pissed at you for something.”

“How do you know her? She hasn’t-“

“Dib-stink! Do you want to hear my newest plan for destroying the humans?!”

“Zim, I’m trying to talk to this person who’s not my sister!”

“Wait, that’s Zim? Let me see him.”

“That is me!” A boy who was undeniably verdant green seemed to grab whatever Dib was communicating with from him “I am Zim!”

“... You’re green.” She said.

“Eh? No! Lies!” He shouted “The Dib has poisoned your mind!”

And he dropped the device and stomped on it multiple times despite Dibs protests until the screen turned to static.

“Wow. An alternate universe where I could’ve dealt with that drooling moron.” She rolled her eyes placing the iPad back in Gaz’s locker “Ah… best not to think about it when this has just started.” Slowly a smile crossed her face “Holy shit… I’m in a battle of wits against evil aliens!” She squealed “I never thought something like this would come around! It’s like I’m an anime protagonist! For realsies!”

  
  


That reminded her. She wasn’t prepared for this at all. I mean, she didn’t look the part. She had to raid her closet for a more flashy look… maybe Grandmas stuff? Oooh, and figure out how to make a cool anime weapon. Maybe she could ask Dib to make one.

She grinned shutting the locker. Today was a good day.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Dib looked at the club attendance. Tak. Keef. Gaz of course. But Leona hadn’t shown up yet. For some reason he felt a pang of disappointment. She was kind of a jerk sure, but he wouldn’t have even started this club without her. He actually had normal conversations with her.

“Alright… let’s get star-“

“Hellooooooooooo!” The door slammed open and Leona appeared, a smile ear to ear across her complexion. But that almost got lost in her new outfit: a bright pink skirt, pink boots with bows on them, pink headband, and little pink hearts stitched into her sleeves.

“Leona? What happened to you?”

“Eh, not much, don't worry about it. I’m too excited for today.” She sat down putting her feet on the desk “After all, I’m talking to the paranormal expert.”

“You said you didn’t believe me.”

“Guess I had a change of heart.” She grinned slyly.

“You made up!” Keef burst from his seat and ran to hug both of them “Oh I’m so happy!”

“So what now? Are we gonna watch Mysterious Mysteries?” Gaz asked snidely.

“No, I found an old necronomicon and- Leona can we talk outside?”

“Huh? Why?”

“I just… can we save it for out there?” He pointed to the door. Leona shrugged and swung her feet around before following him outside.

“Did… something happen?”

“Uh… can’t tell you about that.” She muttered playing with the bow on her headband.

“Okay… uh… you seem… different.”

“Well I guess I am.” She smiled “And it’s all thanks to you!”

“Me? Wait I didn’t really… I… is this genuine?!”

That seemed to catch Leona off guard. She looked to the ground for a second, before giving a smile that was more grounded than the earlier ones she displayed.

“Well… there’s a lot of reasons I can’t tell you. Just straight up can’t. And some reasons that… would probably send you into a crisis if you heard.” What kind of reasoning could do that “But real talk… I feel at home hanging out with you. You didn’t know about where I came from. And from the looks of it, you still don’t care. And I’ve got a whole room of people in there who are way more eccentric than anything I’ve ever had to deal with so there’s nothing to feel out of place about. So… thanks. It really is thanks to you.”

“... And do you really believe me?”

“This time I mean it.” She held out a fist “I do believe you.”

Dib looked at her and cautiously bumped his own fist against hers.

“Okay, that’s settled. Can we start club?”

“Okay. But you really have to follow the instructions this time! Necronomicons aren’t to be messed with!” He watched Leona skip through the door “Hey! Are you listening to me?!”


End file.
